136 MAMMALS

undoubted fact that a ram shot near the base of the
horns will drop stunned as if dead.

Mr. Baillie-Grohman gives an amusing instance of
this. ‘The ram fell as if struck by lightning, a fortu-
nate circumstance, as he was standing on a very narrow
ledge, overhanging a lofty precipice. The slightest

 

THE MUSK OX

struggle would have sent him headlong down the
abyss, a fall which would have smashed his horns to
splinters. When, by crawling along the narrow ledge,
the only possible approach, I got to my quarry, he
seemed as dead asa stone. Where he lay his body
occupied the whole width of the ledge, his legs stretch-